Pickens: Natural Gas Could Curb 60% of US Oil Appetite in 5 Years

T Boone Pickens does not understand the political rhetoric centering expensive energy. He believes the United States already have the cheapest energy in the world--and politicians need to do a better job to communicate that. A huge proponent of the

, Pickens detailed to CNBC's Squawk Box how the US natural gas supply, the largest in the word by far, holds the key to the country's energy independence from current gas pressures. Addressing presidential hopeful Newt Gingrich's pledge of reducing the gas price to $2.50 per gallon, he said any move to curb fuel prices has to involve "attacking" transportation fuel, as fully 70 percent of oil used in the US goes to transportation. Only reducing this portion of the American oil appetite will reduce prices for the rest. Converting the 8 million 18-wheelers currently on our roads today to natural gas from diesel, Pickens maintains, would yield a 60 percent reduction of the 5 million barrels of oil imported into the United States each day. "Do not worry about natural gas being there," he addressed widely expressed concerns of fuel delivery. "The only thing more widely available in the United States today is water," he said, adding that once the Natural Gas Act would go into effect, all existing fuel stations could be changed over within five years. Asked about the Obama administration's claims that the US was a net energy exporter for 2011, Pickens believes proof is in the pudding. "What the administrations speaks about is the net export of refined products." In effect, the US, says Pickens, imports crude, refines it in Texas, and exports it back out. "What the administration should realize," Pickens says, "is that exporting gasoline abroad raises the prices domestically." He believes natural gas provides a far better proposition of export, if that was administration's goal. "When you think Beijing pays $16 for natural gas, and the Middle East and Europe pay [respectively] $15 and $13 for it, then natural gas would be the right energy play." thinks Pickens. However, Pickens would not support the export of, but rather stimulation of domestic demand for natural gas, so that the US can shed its dependence on foreign oil. "I am the only one today who is talking about encouraging domestic demand today, "he told CNCB, with

meaning Congress and the whole of Washington. "We have paid over $1 trillion to OPEC over the past ten years," estimates Pickens. "And we stand to pay another $2.5 trillion over the next ten," he says, unless Washington decides it is time to unlock the promise natural gas unfolds for our domestic transportation energy needs.